One on OneEva Eislerová – Czech designer who reached top of jewellery world in NYC

The Czech artist and designer Eva Eislerová originally wanted to be an
architect. Instead, she became one of the most highly regarded makers of
art jewellery in the world, after emigrating to New York in the 1980s with
her half-Czech, half-English husband, John Eisler. Today Eva Eisler, as she
is known to her collectors, spends most of her time back home in Prague,
where she teaches at the metals department at the Academy of Arts,
Architecture and Design.

“My father was a scientist. He was one of the inventors of robotics. In
the mid 1950s, I think, he put together machine tools and computers. At
that time, computers were something different.

“But eventually he left the country, in 1970 I think. Because he had
been teaching at Manchester University for two years and lectured all over
and then he had to come back here to extend the contract. The Czechs
didn’t want him to continue his work and wrote something very nasty in
the newspapers, and he eventually saved his neck by leaving.”

Did he leave and leave his family behind?

“He did, because he knew that it was impossible to stay longer and try
to arrange for the others to go.

“My mother studied at the academy. She had a great career ahead of her,
but unfortunately got married and had three children and needed to somehow
compromise. But she did her work while bringing up the children, and
eventually when we all left home, she started painting. She was a great
designer also.

“So I had parents who…on one hand, it was very technical, and on the
other it was very artistic.”

Ještěd TowerDo you mind me asking, what impact did it have on your family when your
dad left on his own?

“Well, you can imagine. We were all kicked out of school, not allowed to
continue. I was 21. It was very hard, and very painful, but I had started
working at an architectural office and eventually did some graphic design.
Then I met my husband, who was an architect working at SIAL with [Karel]
Hubáček.

“I joined them and then I had children. When they were three and five we
left for New York, and my life became completely different.”

Am I right in thinking SIAL was the architecture office which designed the
Ještěd Tower and [Prague’s] Tesco building [originally known as Máj]?

“Yes, Hubáček designed the Ještěd Tower, and my husband when he was
24 was one of a team of architects with Martin Rajniš and [Miroslav]
Masák who did Máj – Tesco.”

If we can rewind a little bit, when did you begin being creative, and
making your own jewellery?

“I started making jewellery when I was, I don’t know, 15, and painting
and sculpting. But I didn’t make any big deal about it. My father
didn’t want me to go to an art school, so he suggested I study building
technology and eventually architecture.

“And architecture was and still is my biggest interest, because it’s
three-dimensional, it’s about the living environment, its effects all of
our senses. Jewellery played a very important role in my life when I moved
to New York and I had to take care of my children and couldn’t go and try
to find a job in architecture.

Eva Eislerová - 'XXXL', photo: Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague
“I began working at home and eventually, and very surprisingly, I was
quite successful and got into the best galleries. But at the moment when I
could make things larger, I went…basically I still make jewellery but
I’ve been leaving it behind in recent years. To the great disappointment
of my collectors, I’m moving away from that.”

What was the direct impetus to you and your husband moving to New York?

“My husband was one of the members of a team who was invited to take
part in a competition in West Berlin, the Tegel Hafen. This was 1978, or
something like that. Only the most famous architects were invited, and
surprisingly the jury wanted to give these young Czech architects first
prize.

“Eventually that was not possible, politically, so they received the
second prize. On the jury was Richard Maier, a famous American architect
who had a word with John and said, listen, if you ever happen to be in New
York, I would love you to come and work with me.

“They started corresponding and at one point we decided that this would
be a great idea. But then it took three years to get permission to go.”

Did the fact that your husband already had a pretty good job mean you had
a kind of softer landing than many Czechs who went to New York?

“No. Richard Maier is very famous, but also he doesn’t throw money
around. So even though John had 15 years of experience, he started like a
young architect after school. He worked for 20 hours a day, so he never had
a chance to go out and enjoy New York and meet people.

“But I was full of energy and very curious, so I had to find my own way,
and find the right people. What helped me somehow was my natural instinct
and talent to go to places and talk to the people that I have to talk
to.”

Generally speaking, where do you draw inspiration for your jewellery work?

“I get inspired by spaces by architecture, by details, by constructions,
anything…”

Is making jewellery easier than being an architect? Because with
architecture there’s all the physics of it and making sure that buildings
are safe, for instance.

“It’s like when you ask an architect, can you design jewellery for me?
He thinks that he can scribble something on paper, but it’s horrible.

“He would have to sit down and think about it for a month, to transform
his mind into different…media, a different skill, and then something that
could hold the idea on a smaller scale could come out of that.”

You hadn’t been that many years in New York when the revolution happened
here. Did you at all consider coming back at that time, in ’89?

“No. I’m sorry to say, no.”

When did you begin coming back and how have you found being back here?

“I went to New York with my husband, and then in 2003, after 20 years as
a design partner with Richard Maier, John decided to start on his own –
for one third of his life, he wanted to try to make it on his own.

Photo: Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague
“He accepted some commissions and some competitions to do in the Czech
Republic, but if you are in New York and start your own company you need
about a year to establish yourself, to gain clients, and he spent that year
– or not only a year, a few years – doing projects for the Czech
Republic.

“We had this 250 square-meter apartment in the middle of Manhattan,
which was not cheap, but he was spending most of the time here. So I
decided that after a quarter of a century it’s time to move back to
Europe.

“But I didn’t feel I was going back to the place which I left. It was
a completely different place. It was already part of Europe; it was not
surrounded by high borders. And I felt that we could bring something here,
our experience, and pass it on.”